Can You Repeat the Part Where You Said The Stuff About the Things?

One of the biggest obstacles facing expats in Jakarta is coping with the local language. It isn't the most difficult language to learn and I will shamelessly admit that my Bahasa Indonesia is decent. Over the years, my pronunciation, as well as local people's ability to understand me, has improved dramatically. When I was a newbie, I'd repeat words over and over and get upset when people didn't understand me. Over time, I've learned how to intonate properly in order to be understood. Nowadays, I get compliments from Indonesians that my Bahasa is quite good. I don't think it's that good but maybe that's because I want to improve.

Once one learns the language, one has to deal with some people's inability to listen. I have learned the hard way that some people, once they see that you are not Indonesian, automatically assume that they will not be able to understand a word you say since they don't speak English. When this happens, their ears fill up with wax, their brains go into hibernation mode and their comprehension skills go out the window. It is quite frustrating when this happens.

Some days, I will converse in Bahasa with a dozen people who will have no problem understanding me. Then comes number 13, they just look at me like I am speaking gibberish. They can't understand a thing that I say. Correction, they DON'T EVEN LISTEN to word I say and therefore get confused. If this happened with the majority of people that I speak with, I would consider it to be a fault of my own. Since it doesn't happen most of the time, I feel vindicated.

Here are a few examples:

1) Sometimes, I will be in a taxi with my lady. We will be coming up to a street where we need to turn. I will say "Pak, belok kiri" (elder man/sir, turn left) "Pak, belok kiri" "Pak Pak......Belok kiri" "BELOK KIRI PAK!!!!!". The driver does not even acknowledge that he hears me or that I am speaking. My lady will then say (in the EXACT same intonation as me) "Pak, belok kiri" and the driver will immediately say "Oke" and then turn left. Every time this happens to me, I am absolutely dumbfounded.

2) I am filling my motorbike up with gas. The attendant will ask how much I want. I say "lima belas" (fifteen) He will respond with "Berapa?" (how much). I will repeat myself "lima belas" He will then reply with "sepuluh?" (ten, which sounds NOTHING like fifteen). I slowly repeat myself "liiiima bellaaaaaas". He then replies with "sembilan belas?" (nineteen). I then retort with (whilst counting with my fingers) "satu, dua, tiga, empat, lima belas" (one, two, three, four, five....teen). Blank stare, no response. I regroup and try again whilst pointing at my hand showing 5 digits. "Mendengarkan aku......lima......belas" (listen to me....fifteen). Finally, a response and a shy grin "oooh lima belas, mister"

This is a clear cut case of the attendant seeing my face and losing all composure to the point where he resorted to guessing. If he would have confused tiga (three) with lima (five), I could understand since they sound very similar but the numbers he was guessing did not even sound remotely close to what I was saying.

3) (on the phone, my personal favorite) I call Domino's pizza. "selemat sore, Domino's pizza" (good afternoon, Domino's pizza) "Hello, aku mau pesan pizza" (hello, I want order pizza) "oh, ya, sebentar ya, mister" (wait, ya mister). I get put on hold and eventually another voice comes on the line "Yes, hello mister, you like eating pizza?" (translated into English, this means: Yes, hello, mister, may I take your order). I humor them and switch to English "Hi, I'd like to order pizza" They respond with "Yes, mister........uuuh you eat order pizza? What......you...like? Can Please I have........ number phone" I reply very slowly with "zero......eight.....one". By this point, I switch back to Bahasa as I can tell the guy is totally lost "kosong.......delepan......satu.....tiga" (zero eight one three). After 3 or 4 times of going through the numbers of my phone number and them not being able to find me in their database, the guy puts me on hold again. It is much easier to give them the correct number as opposed to trying to spend 20 minutes explaining my address and exactly where I live. Been there, done that, not easy. Eventually, another voice comes on the line "yes mister, nomor telephonenya?" (yes mister, number telephone you?). I repeat my phone number quickly in Bahasa and the guy gets it correct the first time, no problem. I then place my order and within 30 seconds, everything is accomplished and I hang up. This after being on the line for nearly 10 minutes.

I've played out this situation on numerous occasions. There have been many instances where I "Press one for English" only to have an operator eventually hang up on me because they can't understand me.

A while back, I felt that if I honed my Bahasa Indonesia skills that these instances would cease. It is now abundantly obvious to me that they will never stop, only happen less frequently. The next time I call Domino's, I'm going to ask for the guy who listens well to get on the line.

The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking

After a lengthy visit back home to see family and friends, I've finally made my way back to Jakarta. Being away from here gave me some perspective and time to think about the pros and cons of living in a place such as this. This inspired me to make a list. The list can't be all inclusive since it would be endless and maybe a bit racy. Feel free to leave comments if you agree/disagree or have your own ideas.

Pros of living in Jakarta:

1) 24/7. You can buy pretty much everything whenever and wherever you are. This includes food and beer. There is ample selection of food at any time of day/night and some bars stay open all night or long enough that you don't care that it's time to go home.

2) Cheap cigarettes. I was paying upwards of $8 for a pack of cigarettes back home. In Jakarta, a pack is around $1. You can also smoke pretty much anywhere in Jakarta (don't know if this is a pro or not)

3) Great Food. I enjoyed having really good, properly made pizza back home. There were a few other delicacies that I was happy to have but the novelty of that wore off quickly. Jakarta has excellent food from all over Asia and it is possible to eat fresh food pretty much every day. A lo

t of food back home is processed. The portions back home are massive! I'm glad to be back here eating rice and less than 2000 calories in one sitting.

4) Endless Summer. It's always hot in Jakarta. It rains a lot but the temperature is pretty static. There aren't 10 degree fluctuations from day to day which makes it a little easier to handle. You also know what to expect. It's either going to rain or it isn't.

Side note: Fahrenheit is stupid and you sound stupid when you use it...

5) Transit. There are countless ways to get to where you need to go in Jakarta. These include multiple types of buses, taxis, motorbike taxis, and bajajs. The best part is that all you need to do is go stand by the road and they will come to you. Back home, if someone wasn't driving, I was pretty much stranded or forced to take a very expensive taxi.

6) Cheap & Easy. Everyday items are dirt cheap in Jakarta. Street food is abundant and inexpensive. Everyday items don't break the bank. Gas is around 45 cents a liter and never cha

nges. Lighters don't cost $1.79. Beer may be the only exception to this.

7) Bidets. If you've never used a bidet before, you don't know what you are missing. Nobody uses toilet paper in Jakarta. Every toilet has a spray nozzle sitting next to it for you to spray you know what. It is 1000 times cleaner. Toilet paper is horrible. This is hands down the number one thing that I missed about Jakarta when I was back home. It's a kind of difficult thing to explain so I didn't bring it up much when I was there.

Cons of Living in Jakarta:

1) Traffic. Saying that there is traffic in Jakarta is kind of stating the obvious. I kept making the mistake of overestimating how long it would take to get to places back home. 10 km drives only take 5-10 minutes, not 2 hours. It was funny to hear friends and family back home complain about the traffic when there were more than 5 cars at a street light.

2) Endless Summer. Yes, this is a pro and con. I don't miss cold weather but things never change here. The sunset is at the same-ish time throughout the year. Christmas doesn't seem so festive and nobody really appreciates a beautiful day in Jakarta. The late sunsets back home were awesome. I often forget people's birthdays or important days since it's hard to make a distinction between May or November in Jakarta.

3) Music. Most bars/restaurants in Jakarta all play the same music. I know the lyrics to more pop songs than I would like to. When a band is playing at a place in Jakarta, I often leave since the sound mix is horrible. Often, the high notes from a guitar make your ears twitch a bit. I saw quite a few excellent local musicians playing on a random night at random places back home. I also saw a great concert and could have seen a couple more if I had the money. The radio back home has countless stations that play countless genres of music.

4) The Internet. On a good day in Jakarta, the Internet sucks. It took a trip back home to make me fully realize this. I felt like an old man who was fascinated by being able to watch youtube videos without waiting for them to load. You can watch pretty much anything instantly and can download at shockingly fast speeds. I get pretty excited when I can download at 50 kb/s in Jakarta.

5) Lack of Green Space. There aren't really any parks in Jakarta and not many people have back yards. People back home were starting to think that I was weird because I often wanted to walk to places nearby or hang out in their backyards all day long. This makes me feel bad for my dog more than anything (kasian-jing).

6) Stranger in a Strange Land. No matter how long I live here or how well I learn the language, I'll always be a 'bule'. This will never change. It took me years to realize this. Back home, I'm just another face in the crowd.

7) No Family. I've made some lifelong friends here but friends come and go. Family is forever. Seeing my family, especially my sister's baby made me realize that. Wish there was some way that the other side of the world wasn't so far away. I guess Skype helps.

No matter what way I slice it, I'd never be content being here nor there. So I'll just have to look on the bright side of things. The durian may be spiky and smell bad but there's some good stuff in there.